THE ARRIVAL OF THE TELEVISION IN SPAIN

THE INTRODUTION OF THE T.V. IN SPAIN

By Inés Moraga.

Nowadays we are used to the television and we almost have it switch it on, all day long. But before people have television at home, life was quite different. This event happened in the year 1956. Television was invented by a German Paul Nipkow. We have asked people who lived the transition from the radio to the TV, one nun Lola from Ces Don Bosco, two priests, also from this university, Jose María and Lorenzo and my mother in order to have information from first-hand about this event. This essay will describe the changes in their lives brought about by the television.

Before people had TV their lives were rather different, for example people knew about the news from newspapers and radio. And these news were not so quickly to come to the houses as nowadays with the TV. Nowadays at nighttime we watch TV but at that time my mother says that they listened to the radio or read a book

In the radio they didn’t listen only to the news, they also had radio novels, Lola, the nun, remember specially one of them called “Ana Rosa”. Javier talked us about another one called “La Doctora Francis” where that doctor gave advice to people who send letters to her, telling her their problems and asking for advice. Later on they discovered that the Doctor Francis was not a woman, instead was a man, a journalist, he wrote the answers but his voice was made by another person.

Like all the changes, at the beginning they were afraid and didn’t like the idea of the television. We can see this in the magazine Radio television that said “the television will be add to the numbers of inventions that makes life more complicated if you want to, but more interested too”

At the beginning not all the families could buy a television, only the rich families. That’s why not all the televisions came at the same time in every family, Lola remember that before having television on her house they went to an oncology hospital because that was the first place in having one. She was one of the first families in having television at home, so all the children went to her house to watch it. In 1960 that situation changed, television could be paid by installment. Even so, there were great differences between some areas and others, the 70-80% of the televisions was at urban areas like Madrid, Barcelona, Pais Vasco, and only 25% of the farmers had a television. But in the second half of the decade of the years sixties, television lives its “years of gold”. *

Television as well has change; it is not the same as today. At the beginning it had only one channel, it consisted in the retransmission of the mass, official speeches, etc. Javier explained that in the Franco regime the retransmissions had political controlled. *blogmastervero.blogspot.com/.../historia-de-la-television-en-espana.h...

After some years it came the second channel, “la primera” had popular programs and “la segunda” had more cultural programs. In the years eighty begins the autonomics channels.

All the programs were in black and white. Neither it was all the day long, my mother says that it begun around 14.00 with the “carta de ajuste”, at 15.00 you could watch the newscast and at 24.00 the retransmission finished. When a film wasn’t recommended for children under 14 years old, they signed it with one diamond and when it wasn’t recommended for children under 18 years old they put two diamonds. There were also programs for children with clowns. And Javier thinks that television has help to vocalize in a better way, because the presenters were forced to speak well. Before the entrance of the television he says that you could not understand people of the south of Spain but afterwards they improved, the ceceo and seseo has decreased a lot with the television.

About the programs in the television all of the interviewed remember the first football match they watched on TV, especially the men. Although Javier has told us that before the television, they listened to the matches in the radio and they retransmitted so well that it was if you were watching it. And my mother says that there were a lot of contests.

Television had repercussion not only in the houses; pubs were one of the first places in having television because it was a claim for consumers. But the cinemas didn’t have so much luck with the entrance of the television because people preferred to watch TV than going to the cinema. In the cinemas they watched dumb films. And they also had news of the world called “Nodo”.

The first television in color came in 1975. Javier remembers the first thing he saw in color, and it was the king’s coronation. But outside Spain, the color in the television came before, that’s why Lola’s brother in law and sister brought a television from Germany, there was in color and here was not in color yet, so here they saw it in black and blue.

Asking Lorenzo what he thinks about the television he has said that it is a great invention, a good vehicle of information and as teachers we are going to be, we have to teach how to see the television, to be critical with the programs in the television, we can’t think that everything that is on television is good.

Doing this research I think I can say that the television has been a great invention, it has bring with it good changes in the lives of the people. Although we have an overuse of it nowadays.